


A Profittable Interview

by Russ (Quasar)



Category: Wiseguy
Genre: Early Work, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-02
Updated: 2011-03-02
Packaged: 2017-10-16 01:15:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/166865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quasar/pseuds/Russ
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Uncle Mike falls into the clutches of Mel and Susan Profitt. Can he get himself out safely, or is Vinnie's cover ruined?</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Profittable Interview

**Author's Note:**

> Written in April 1996. This story takes place after the main part of the first-season episode "Not for Nothing," but before the epilogue.

Frank McPike stared out the window at the hospital grounds. "So it's all over," he said. "You won't have to worry about Aldo Baglia any more."

Vinnie rolled his head on the pillow and frowned. "Frank, you didn't --"

Frank favored the patient with a glare. "No, I didn't kill him. Which isn't to say that I didn't consider it. It would have been a real pleasure to wrap my hands around that little bastard's neck. But he got away from me. I had given up and I was heading back to my car, when he fell off a building right at my feet."

"Fell or was pushed?" Vinnie murmured.

"If he was pushed, I don't know who did it. It sure as heck wasn't me. I suppose it's possible he jumped."

"Come on, Frank. Why would Aldo want to kill himself?"

Frank shrugged. "His father died a couple of weeks ago."

"Joey Bags?"

"That's right. Keeled over from a heart attack. And last night I got news from Philly, about Mack Mahoney."

"That fat slob," Vinnie snorted.

"Apparently he decided to try a new diet. He chowed down on the barrel of a .38. So now it really is over. Steelgrave, Patrice, Mahoney, Baglia -- they're all dead. And their top men are all indicted. The mob operations on the Atlantic seaboard have been decimated."

"They'll recover," Vinnie predicted flatly.

"Not for a while. I grant you, New York is pulling together faster than Philadelphia. They're falling back on some of their old capos who've been retired for years, like Aiuppo." Frank glanced at his watch. "Has your Uncle Mike been by to see you today?"

"No, not yet."

"I thought he said his flight was at noon. Guess he didn't have time to come and say goodbye."

"That's too bad. I'm glad I finally got to meet him, though," Vinnie said. "Now at least I can picture the guy at the other end of the phone line." His glance flickered to the glass doorway. "Look, I told you," he said suddenly, in a loud, irritated tone, "I don't know anything about Aldo Baglia. I haven't seen him in months."

Frank gaped in confusion until he noticed the figure approaching from the corner of his eye. He drew himself up quickly. "Well, you and Baglia were the only ones who slipped through our fingers. Now we know he's dead, we'll be watching you a lot closer, mister."

"Yeah, right, tell me another one. I'm not even in the States. You have no jurisdiction here, mister," Vinnie spat.

"Is there a problem?" asked a light voice by the doorway.

Frank had seen the photos and watched her through telephoto lenses, but he caught his breath anyway at his first good sight of Susan Profitt. Her delicate beauty belied the deadly Profitt reputation, and her wide blue eyes projected an air of innocence. She was wearing a light blouse and ostensibly casual slacks that revealed her elegant curves far more intimately than any dress. Frank could see how Vinnie had fallen into her trap. "No problem," he answered belatedly. "I was just asking Mr. Terranova a few questions."

"And you are?" She tilted her head inquiringly.

"Frank McPike, OCB." Frank pulled out his badge.

Her gaze sharpened. "Well, Mr. McPike, I'm Mr. Terranova's employer. If you have a problem with him, you can come to me first. There's no need to harass a sick man."

"This doesn't concern you, ma'am," said Frank sourly. "It has to do with Mr. Terranova's former employer."

"Well, I believe it's already been pointed out that you have no official powers here in Vancouver. Certainly you have no business bothering a man in a hospital bed. If you want to speak to Mr. Terranova, you'll have to wait until he's discharged."

Frank tucked his identification away and shot Vinnie a glance. "That's all right. I was already finished here." He stalked out of the hospital room, resisting the powerful urge to stop and look back. The ball was back in Vinnie's court now.

 

Just a few minutes after Frank's departure, Dan Burroughs stepped out of the elevator and glanced up at the clock on the wall. It was a good thing his flight had turned out to be later than he thought, because there was no way he was going to make it to the airport by noon. He stepped into Vinnie's room and considered the patient, sleeping peacefully with his mouth open.

Dan sighed. "Well, Vinnie, I was going to say goodbye," he murmured softly, "but I just don't have the heart to wake you." He shook his head regretfully and turned toward the door.

A stunningly beautiful woman was standing in the doorway, watching him. Dan wasn't sure if his heart was speeding because of her beauty, or because he had guessed who this was.

"Are you a friend of Vinnie's?" Susan Profitt asked innocently.

"No, ma'am." Dan forced out a smile and switched his grip on his cane so that he could extend his hand. "I'm Mike Terranova, Vinnie's uncle. You must be Susan Profitt."

"Yes." She shook his hand. "I didn't know Vinnie had any relatives out here."

"Oh, no -- I own a hardware store in Jersey. I just flew out here because I heard Vinnie had been shot." Dan glanced at the sleeping agent. Wake up, Vinnie, and get me out of this!

"Really?" Susan breathed. "Come out here and we'll talk. I wouldn't want to disturb Vinnie's sleep."

"No, of course not." Swallowing hard, Dan followed her out into the central lobby.

"So Vinnie's told you about me?" she asked, leaning against the nurses' counter.

Dan put on his most charming smile. "He said he was working for a lady who was very, very smart and very, very beautiful. I figure there couldn't be two women like that in Vancouver, so you must be the one."

Susan's eyes sparkled. "How did you find out Vinnie was shot? Mel and I never notified anyone in his family."

Dan tensed, realizing the danger behind the question. He tried to make his nervousness look like an attempt to remember. "I got a phone call. Must have been somebody Vinnie works with."

"Ah. Was it Roger?" Susan suggested.

"It was two in the morning, I don't remember the name." Dan shrugged helplessly. "Well, look, I'd love to stay and chat with you, but I have a plane to catch."

"Oh, we can take you to the airport. We're going that way, aren't we, Roger?" She spoke past Dan's left shoulder.

He turned to find a man who hadn't been there a moment before, a man with an open, boyish face and the stance of a trained fighter. So this was Roger Loccoco, the shadowy contract assassin who left bodies strewn in his wake. Roger's gaze flickered over Dan, assessing him as a minimal threat.

"This is Vinnie's uncle, Mike Terranova," Susan said. "It was sweet of you to call and let him know Vinnie had been hurt, Roger, but why didn't you tell us he had a relative coming to visit?"

Roger's eyes narrowed ever so slightly as they rested on Dan. Dan started preparing a better explanation of who had called him, to deliver after Roger made his denial.

Roger's mouth curved. "Oh, well, when I called, we weren't sure if he would be able to make it out here. Isn't that right, Mr. Terranova?"

Dan agreed, then realized too late that he had fallen into a trap. Now they both knew the other was lying, and Roger had a weapon to use against him. He cleared his throat. "Well, ah, it's very nice of you to offer me a ride," he began, "but really, I couldn't."

"Oh, it's no trouble," Susan assured him. "We couldn't let you ride out to the airport all alone."

"I have a cab waiting downstairs," Dan lied.

"Roger, call downstairs. Have them pay off the cabdriver and send Mr. Terranova's bags up here."

"No bags," Dan said. "I left home in a real hurry. This is all I brought." He jerked his chin at the aging backpack he wore.

Susan nodded sweetly and tucked his hand under her elbow. "That's settled, then, Mr. Terranova -- can I call you Mike? We'll get you to the airport in style."

It turned out that Susan's idea of "style" was a private helicopter on the roof of the hospital. Roger sat next to the pilot and Dan ended up in the back with Susan, but fortunately there was too much noise for conversation. It gave Dan a blessed interval in which to think.

McPike was going to go ballistic when he found out Susan and Roger had met "Mike Terranova," however briefly. He didn't think he had broken Vinnie's cover yet, but both of them were suspicious -- especially Roger. Dan had messed up badly on that question of who had notified him. It was just too long since he had done any undercover work, and he wasn't accustomed to thinking on his toes.

Five minutes into their flight, Dan realized that they were over the water. "I thought you were taking me to the airport!" he bellowed at Susan.

She smiled and patted his hand. "I want you to meet my brother!" she yelled back. "We can have dinner, talk about Vinnie!"

"But my flight!" He groped for his plane ticket, making Roger turn his head sharply.

"We'll get you another ticket," Susan shouted. "Don't worry!" She grinned broadly at him.

It was impossible to argue any further under the noisy conditions, and clearly they could do anything they wanted with Dan now that they had him in their chopper. He desperately wanted to know whether Susan was just stringing him along or planning to send him safely on his way after a little tete-a-tete. But pushing the matter far enough to figure out Susan's motivations would cause a whole new set of problems. He gazed out the window and tried to figure out just what kind of game she was playing.

It was supposed to be Mel Profitt, not his sister, who was insane and unpredictable. Mel might have done something bizarre like this with no ulterior motive; Susan had to have a firm reason. But if she wasn't crazy, Susan was still very rich and accustomed to getting what she wanted. She might think it perfectly normal to kidnap a man in order to have a conversation with him. And if she still believed he was Vinnie's uncle, she might simply want to talk about her newest toy.

On the other hand, she was a savvy businesswoman and a deep schemer. Something might have happened in the past few days -- something involving Aldo Baglia, perhaps -- to punch a hole in Vinnie's cover. If that was the case, she would suspect the truth about Dan as well. It didn't matter if they tortured Dan or used drugs. It didn't even matter if he held out and gave them no information. He was sitting here across from Susan Profitt, claiming to be a man who didn't exist and who had never entered this country, carrying a passport and plane ticket in his real name along with his OCB badge. If Susan suspected him just enough to search him, the whole case was blown, and he and Vinnie were about to become casualties of the Profitt way of doing business.

His only option was to play it as if he were an innocent hardware salesman come to visit his nephew, and hope that Susan really believed him. Ready or not, he was going undercover.

Dan -- no, Mike Terranova, he reminded himself -- groaned under his breath as the chopper began to circle over an elegant pleasure-yacht gracing the waters below. From what Vinnie had told him about the parties on the Hotei, this was going to be a very trying day.

He climbed down from the helicopter with Roger's help and glanced around, clutching the strap of his backpack. Susan was conferring with the pilot. Roger was turning toward security men who were approaching them. Mike took a step toward the railing, as if to get out of the way. It was easy to push a little too hard on his cane and overbalance. He caught himself on the railing with the same hand that carried his backpack, and before Roger had reached his side he let the strap slip from his hands. He watched in secret satisfaction as all his identification disappeared into the Pacific.

Roger grabbed him and righted him, and Susan appeared instantly, all contrite. "I'm so sorry, Mike!" she called over the whine of the rotor blades. "I should have asked Roger to carry that for you. We'll replace everything, I promise." She took his arm and started to lead him away as if he were incapable of walking on his own.

"Yeah, that was pretty stupid, wasn't it?" he said, glancing over his shoulder. "Sorry, I haven't been on a boat in a while." In fact, he couldn't feel the motion of the yacht at all. "It's all right, though, the only thing valuable in that bag was my plane ticket."

"I told you, we'll get you another ticket. And some new clothes and a shaving kit. They'll be waiting for you when we come ashore tonight."

Mike acted flustered. "Well . . . that's very generous of you, Miss Profitt."

"Susan, please."

"Susan. It really isn't necessary, though."

"Oh, it's the least I can do! If we had known you were coming here, we could have gotten you a room at the Georges Cinq and you could have told us all about Vinnie. I have to make it up to you somehow, since I'm delaying you from getting home."

"Delay, yeah . . . say, is there any way I could make a phone call? I don't want the guys to worry when I don't want to show up at the airport." This was the moment. If the cover had been blown, they would never let him make a call. There would be some excuse -- an unexpected failure of the connection, perhaps.

"Of course!" Susan trilled. "Roger will show you where the phone is. Roger?"

The all-american contract killer cocked his head engagingly. "Right this way, Mr. Terranova," he said, gesturing to the innards of the boat.

They passed through a small bar with a lot of people talking and dancing, then another room with a mirrored table holding cocaine in elegant silver dishes. People in the corners were slowly making embarrassingly intimate motions. Everyone was dressed -- those who weren't naked -- in clothes that would have cost Mike a month's salary. Everyone was beautiful, everyone was healthy except for the drugs they were shoveling into their bodies. And here came Mike Terranova in his thrift-store clothes and his prostheses with the right knee that kept getting stuck straight. He pinned a smile to his face and kept his eyes on Roger's back.

They went down a flight of stairs, which Mike managed slowly but steadily, to a quieter level of the boat. Another room with a bar in the corner, but this one was unoccupied. Roger flourished his hand at a telephone hanging on the wall. "What number would you like to call?"

Mike had considered this. If they were only suspicious of him, they might let him make a call but record it -- or in this case, openly listen in. The problem was that he wasn't supposed to be undercover, so he had no Lifeguard and no established access code. Using Vinnie's access codes would probably just cause some horrible mix-up. He could try to call Frank at his hotel, but he might not get through -- and Roger would know instantly that it was a Vancouver number. "My hardware store," he said firmly, and gave his own emergency number. Roger dialed and handed him the phone with a smile.

AG had taken over the line, but he didn't answer with the Sailor Hardware line because he had other agents to look after, and Vinnie wasn't supposed to be calling in today.

"Hey, Andy," Mike said, "it's Mike Terranova." Did AG even know that name? "Give Frank a message for me, will ya?" He didn't dare use McPike's full name. AG would just have to figure out who he was talking about. "Tell him I'm not going to make it back to the hardware store as soon as I planned. Vinnie's boss gave me an invitation I just couldn't turn down. This way maybe Vinnie and I can have breakfast together." That was the usual code for an emergency pull-out, but would AG pick up on it? "I'll get in touch as soon as I know when I'm coming in." He set the receiver down.

Roger's ears were attuned to words that didn't belong. "So, you're going to have breakfast with Vinnie?"

Mike shrugged. "If I can make it. I was going to be there this morning, but I just got held up. By the time I got to the hospital, the bum was asleep, anyway."

"Yeah, isn't that just like him?" Roger chuckled. "Come on, Susan will be in the stateroom waiting to talk to you."

Mike took a deep, cautious breath as he followed his guide through the door. There was no way he was going to know if he had passed the test until they either killed him or let him go.

 

The stateroom was sumptuous and seemed somehow larger than the yacht itself. Susan was draped gracefully over a comfortable chair. "Sit down, Mike, make yourself comfortable," she urged. "Have you had any lunch?"

"Ah, no." Mike sank into the other chair, unsure that he would ever be able to get up.

She turned to Roger. "Ask Arnaud to send us up . . . " she gave Mike a measuring glance. "A shellfish platter, the one with the salmon mousse."

"Sounds delicious," Mike approved. Actually, it was hard to imagine being hungry right now, with the state his nerves were in, but he was sure he would have loved the mousse any other time.

"So!" She smiled at him. "Tell me about Vinnie."

Genuine interest, or just bait to lure him into making a mistake? "Well . . . " his mind whirred. "Vinnie's father was my older brother, you know. John always took good care of me when we were kids. I wasn't around all that much when Vinnie was growing up, but about the time I got my hardware store was when John died and Vinnie got out of high school. He started getting into trouble then -- you know, high-spirited kids' pranks and stuff. I sorta took him under my wing, tried to look after him. For John." Mike shrugged, warming to the subject. "I kept trying to give him a job in the hardware store, you know -- especially after he spent a few months in jail. But I guess he learned how to keep his nose clean, because he steadied down and started making a real name for himself."

Susan was leaning forward, her lips parted with fascination. It seemed she really did want to pump him for information about Vinnie. Mike just might get out of this alive, if he could walk the tightrope between what little he knew about Vinnie's real background and whatever lies or half-lies the agent had already told Susan.

"Does he have other family still living?"

"Oh, sure, his mother and brother. His brother's a priest." That was about the extent of Mike's knowledge of Pete Terranova. "A real sweet kid, but I never hit it off with him the way I did with Vinnie, you know? I guess I saw myself in Vinnie, especially when he would get himself into some scrape." Mike ventured another piece of the truth. "He and his mother had a falling out when he went to jail. She wouldn't even talk to him for a while. But a few months ago she broke her arm, ended up in the hospital -- we managed to get them reconciled."

"That's good. I know Vinnie misses his mother. He mentioned her to me."

That had been a good bet, then. Mike tried not to show his growing relief on his face.

Roger reappeared with a tray of food, which was not a good sign. Roger was clearly not a waiter and should have been bored to tears with this conversation, but of course he knew that Mike had lied at least about the phone call. Even if Susan was on the level, Roger was still suspicious. He set the tray on the table, laid out a couple of plates, and came back to pull Mike out of the low chair with a firm, unembarrassed grasp.

"Thank you, Roger," Susan said flatly. "Did you finish with that matter Mel was worried about?"

"Yep, it's all taken care of," Roger replied cheerfully, not seeming to notice her unfriendly tone.

"Well, there's no need for you to stay here and babysit me. I'm sure Mike isn't a security risk." She smiled humorously.

"Huh?" said Mike, as if oblivious to all the undertones. "Oh, no, of course not." He moved to the table. "This is quite a spread."

"Isn't it, though?" Roger said. "I'm pretty hungry myself. You don't mind if I stay and listen to Mike's stories, do you, Sue? I'd love to hear about Vinnie's childhood."

Mike sat down, using the motion to conceal the strain on his face. Roger was suspicious, all right, and having two of them listening to his fabric of lies would double the risk of being caught out.

"Perhaps you should go get an extra plate, then," Susan suggested.

"Oh, look, Arnaud already put an extra plate on the tray. How thoughtful of him." Roger grinned smugly.

Susan sat down and turned toward Mike, excluding Roger by her body language. "Vinnie told me he used to spend a lot of time at Coney Island with his friends."

"Oh, yeah, the kid loved the place. Especially the red-hots."

"Nathan's?"

"Yeah! You been there?"

"No, but Vinnie mentioned them to me."

"Oh, Nathan's are the best." Mike had been to Coney Island enough times to paint a colorful picture. He related a series of escapades, partly borrowed from his own experience and partly woven out of whole cloth, and attributed them all to Vinnie. He added in Nick Lucci, the only one of Vinnie's old friends whose name he knew, and babbled on until even Roger's eyes began to glaze over. When Mike started to go hoarse, he took a sip of wine and chuckled. "But look at this! I've been talking so much I've hardly even touched this great food." He chewed a mouthful of very fine seafood without tasting it.

Susan began to say something about her own unhappy childhood and how they had been shuffled from one foster home to another. Roger looked ready to believe that Mike's lie about the phone call had been a simple mistake, and Susan was relaxed and happy.

By now, Mike estimated as he played with his food, Vinnie's hospital room would be under guard. As soon as he could be moved, Vinnie would be taken to a safe house. Frank would have mobilized all the Canadian police that he could intimidate with his badge, and they would be discussing possible ways to get Mike off the Hotei. There weren't many choices, Mike knew. Force was pretty much out of the question on a private yacht carrying a few hundred random civilians and a security force of unknown strength. But if Mike could just persuade them to set him on shore -- and the chances of that were looking better every minute -- he might make it out of this with a whole skin. At least Vinnie was safe -- unless Susan had been adding some drug to his IV this morning.

No, Susan didn't really suspect Vinnie, or Mike. All he had to do was keep the ball rolling another couple of hours, and Mike would be home free. Only one thing could really complicate the matter.

The only thing that could complicate the matter opened the door and stepped into the stateroom. Mel Profitt wore a conservative business suit. He was short, and just a little bit overweight. His hair was thinning on top. He didn't look at all dangerous, but Mike suddenly found it hard to swallow the food that was in his mouth.

Mel's gaze passed briefly over Mike, but he didn't smile or acknowledge him. "Hey, kid," he said to his sister.

"Mel, you're back!" cried Susan. She hurried to his side and rested a hand on his shoulder. "How are you feeling?" she asked anxiously.

"I'm fine," Mel replied dully. "Roger, could I talk to you for a moment?"

Roger went into a huddle in the corner with his employer, while Susan tried to divide herself between smiling politely at Mike and watching her brother worriedly. Mike fiddled with his fork and tried to remain inconspicuous. Mel Profitt was notoriously moody, and it seemed today his mood was not a good one.

"Well, you do that, then," Mel snapped suddenly. Roger shrugged, tossed a small wave toward Mike and Susan, and left with his spirits undampened. Mel crossed over to the table. "So, Susie, did you visit Vince?"

Susan nodded. "Yes, he's looking much better today. The doctor says he can be discharged in a couple of days. And look who I met at the hospital! Mike, this is my brother, Mel Profitt. Mel, this is Mike Terranova, Vinnie's uncle."

Mel still didn't look straight at Mike. "Nice to meet you." His face might have been made of wood, for all the expression it showed.

Mike worked up another artificial smile. "Hey, I'm glad to meet you, too. You folks have done pretty well by Vinnie."

"Mike has been telling us all about Vinnie's childhood," Susan said brightly.

Mel just stared at her.

"Mel, you're not feeling well, are you?" Susan put an arm around his shoulders. "I knew I shouldn't have let you go see Tripton on your own." She turned to Mike. "I'm terribly sorry. You'll have to excuse us, my brother isn't well." Her brow was furrowed with deep distress.

"Hey, it's okay, you don't have to explain it to me. You gotta take care of your family. I understand that, or I wouldn't be here in Vancouver, obviously." Mike levered himself to his feet.

"Yes," Mel said slowly, almost hypnotically. "The ties of blood are the only ties that --" He broke off as Mike moved out from behind the table. "You have prosthetic legs?" His voice cracked out like a whip.

Mike blinked. "Yeah, I lost mine in an accident nearly fifteen years ago." He watched Mel warily. "Is there a problem?"

Mel turned to Susan. "You brought a man with no legs onto the Hotei?"

"Mel, he's Vinnie's uncle!" Susan protested.

"I don't care if he's God's uncle! Don't you understand the significance? Are you trying to sink my ship? I want him out of here at once. Get out!"

"No!" Susan cried. "Mike, wait. Don't go. Mel --"

He pushed her roughly away from him.

"It's okay," Mike said hastily, fascinated and repelled to be witnessing one of the tantrums Vinnie had described. "I have to go to the, uh . . ." He headed for the door and let himself out as Susan clung to Mel, pleading with him.

Outside the door of the stateroom, Mike took a deep breath. "And Vinnie puts up with this every day?" he whispered. "You couldn't pay me enough to stick around this guy!" Pulling himself together, he bent his head to the closed door.

"Don't you get it, Susie? For thousands of years, mystics have warned us of the dangers. When you take away a part of a man -- an eye, a hand, a leg -- he acquires new abilities to replace what has been lost. The blind man knows the future. The crippled man . . . I can't believe you let him on our boat! My God, do you realize this man has no toes?"

"Mel, please!" Susan was weeping. "You're upset. Let me get your medicine."

"I don't need my medicine! What I need is for that gimp to get off my boat, before we sink to the bottom of the ocean! You get rid of him, Susie. Do it now!"

Mike moved away from the door just a moment before Susan came through, her eyes red and her hair in disarray. "Mike, I'm so sorry!" she said. "My brother doesn't know what he's saying."

"Hey, it's all right," Mike assured her. "Vinnie told me a little about your brother."

She sniffed. "He did? What did he say?"

"That Mel is a brilliant businessman, but kinda eccentric. If he doesn't want me here, that's not a problem. I don't really belong in a place like this anyway. This is more Vinnie's style, you know? You just go on taking good care of my nephew, and Mel can say whatever he wants about me."

She gave him a watery smile. "Now you're the one who's being generous."

"Well, I never could bear to see a pretty lady cry."

"Generous," she repeated in a sharper tone, snapping her fingers. "We have to hurry." She led him back into the small bar across the hall and unlocked a table drawer with a small gold key. "Roger will be flying out as soon as the helicopter is ready. You can go with him, he'll take you to the airport. I'm really sorry we have to say goodbye like this." She took a syringe case out of the drawer and handed him a fat wad of bills -- a fat wad of hundred-dollar bills, Mike realized. There must be at least twenty-five hundred dollars in that stack.

"Oh, I can't. You've already given me a wonderful meal, with charming company. I don't need your money."

"Think of it as an investment in your hardware store." Susan urged him toward the stairs. "If you come to see Vinnie again, I'll expect a return on that investment."

At the top of the stairs, she handed Mike off to some fellow she called Marcos, and hurried back down to the stateroom, syringe case in hand. Mike was bundled back into the helicopter and wafted off the Hotei before he could catch his breath.

He looked from the pilot's back to Roger's and smiled a secret smile. In all the times he had encountered that squeamish reaction to his missing legs, he had never before been wholeheartedly grateful. He couldn't guess how Vinnie could put up with this kind of thing. He would only get away with it as long as he could stay one step ahead of that madman in the stateroom. Unfortunately, that madman was also a genius. Mike shook his head incredulously.

 

This time, Mike was relieved to note, they went straight to the airport. The chopper settled down delicately, and Roger gave him a hand down to the ground. "This way, Buckwheat," said Roger. "We have to see a man about a dog." He conducted Mike toward a set of stairs leading up into the airport terminal.

A man was waiting for them inside the terminal, with a small leather overnight bag slung over his shoulder. He gave Roger a nod and handed the bag to Mike.

"Replacements for your belongings," Roger said. "Susan never forgets a promise."

"Oh. Thanks." Mike scratched his jaw, at a loss. It looked as if his heart could stop beating double-time. But there was one more thing he should do, to protect Vinnie's cover. "Was it really you that called me the other night?" he asked innocently. "I was pretty groggy at the time, but it didn't sound quite like your voice."

Roger's gaze sharpened. "Actually, it wasn't me," he admitted after a moment. "I just thought it was easier to let Susan go on thinking whatever she thought."

Mike nodded. "Well, do you know who it was that called? I'd like to thank the guy."

"Sorry, Buckwheat, it wasn't one of my employees. Maybe it was one of Vinnie's men here in Vancouver." Roger watched Mike like a cat watching a mousehole. Vinnie had mentioned that Roger became suspicious after he implied he had a network of informants.

"Huh? Vinnie never said anything about anyone working for him." Mike shrugged. "Maybe it was somebody from the hospital. Vinnie carries one of my business cards in his wallet. They must have been trying to contact his next of kin. I just don't remember anything before the words 'your nephew has been shot.'"

Roger looked almost convinced, which was probably the best anyone could expect from a professional paranoid.

"Hey, I should give you one of my cards. You can call me if Vinnie has any more trouble." Mike patted himself. "Oh, no, I forgot, I lost all my stuff on the boat."

"That's okay. I'll make sure Vinnie gives me your number." Roger shook hands. "It's been nice talking to you, Buckwheat."

"Yeah, same here. You keep an eye on Vinnie for me, okay?" Mike watched as the assassin headed back toward the chopper with his flunky in tow. "I can't believe I actually used to like undercover work!" he muttered to himself. "I gotta remind Frank what a pain it is." With a shaky sigh, he lowered himself into one of the seats in a nearby waiting area so he could examine the bag.

A couple of casual but very expensive silk shirts, tweed slacks, underwear, a tie. A small but very complete shaving kit. A first-class ticket on the evening flight to Newark, in the name of Mike Terranova. Nothing seemed to be bugged or booby-trapped, but he left the bag sitting there while he walked to the bank of pay-phones and dialed McPike's hotel.

"Room 432, please," he told the receptionist, and heaved a sigh of relief when Frank picked up at once. "Frank, it's Mi-- Dan. I'm all right. I think the cover's secure, but you'll want to keep a guard on Vinnie for a few days anyway. I'm going to need some new paperwork, too. Should I come to the hotel and debrief?"

There was a long pause. "Uncle? What are you talking about? I was just on my way out the door for dinner. Aren't you supposed to be back in Jersey by now?"

Dan swallowed. "You mean you didn't know? AG never contacted you?" A wave of anger rushed through him, fueled by all the adrenaline he had produced in the last six hours. The man had no business being a Lifeguard if he couldn't even recognize an emergency phone call when he heard it!

Then Dan was forcibly struck by the contrast between what he thought was going on and what really had happened. While he had been struggling mind-to-mind with Susan Profitt, there had been no guard on Vinnie's room, no frantic blood checks to see if he had been given some poison, no strike team considering whether to board the Hotei. Instead of chewing his lower lip to shreds, Frank had been lying in his hotel room catching up on missed sleep and contemplating a pleasant evening with that lady from State.

Dan was laughing so hard he hung up the phone without meaning to. Then he retrieved his bag and headed out of the airport to get a cab to Frank's hotel. He would give the driver a Ben Franklin and tell him to keep the change, Dan decided. It would be worth it just to see the look on Frank's face when he told his story.

 

April 1996


End file.
